OUTPOURING OF LOVE
Rabbi Yisroel Miller, at the House of Jacob Mikveh Congregation in southwest Calgary, raised his 11 children in the neighbourhood of Squirrel Hill in Pittsburgh, where 11 Jewish people were murdered while worshipping on Saturday morning.
Rabbi Yisroel Miller is in Calgary today. But his heart and mind are thousands of miles away in Pittsburgh.
On Saturday, an anti-Semitic man sporting an assault rifle and three handguns stormed into a synagogue in the historic Squirrel Hill district of the Pennsylvania city and murdered 11 congregants and injured six others before he fled.
It is a normally peaceful neighbourhood that Miller knows intimately.
“This really hits very close to home for me,” said the 69-year-old rabbi at House of Jacob Synagogue in southwest Calgary.
“The place where you raise your children never leaves you. My wife and I raised our five boys and six girls just blocks away from where this shooting happened.
“They were all raised there and all but two were born there. They all went to Jewish schools there and they’re all very proud Pittsburghers,” said Miller, who was rabbi for 30 years at Poale Zedeck (Righteous Workers) Orthodox Synagogue, a Pittsburgh congregation that was founded in 1881.
“I was reading the names of the victims — I did not know them personally — but I know some of their relatives, so my heart is very, very heavy. It is with them.”
The accused gunman, Robert Bowers, 46, surrendered to police after being shot in the melee. His social media profile was filled with anti-Semitic hatred and he allegedly spewed anti-Jewish phrases as he gunned down innocent praying people. Authorities are seeking the death penalty for Bowers, who appeared in a Pittsburgh court Monday morning to face 29 charges.
“The knowledge that we are targeted simply because of an accident of birth, based on nothing you’ve done, on the one hand, is frightening,” said Miller. “But it also brings us together.”
Miller says while sad, he has been buoyed by the love and concern of many friends and complete strangers in Calgary who have called him to pass along their condolences.
“It’s especially heartening, though, that so many of our nonJewish neighbours have come out to support us,” he said.
“I’ve received calls in Calgary from Christians I don’t even know,” said Miller, who is the president of the Calgary Council of Christians and Jews.
“They simply want to call to express support. That’s a very beautiful thing. And Calgary can be very proud. People care. These incidents which show the worst of humanity also bring out the best of humanity. So we take hope at heart in that.”
One of the people who called Miller Saturday was Rev. Ray Matheson, a pastor at First Alliance Church in Calgary’s southeast, a vice-president of the council and a dear friend of Miller’s.
“I am so upset about this,” said Matheson of the shooting that is considered the largest mass killing of Jews in U.S. history.
“I think anti-Semitism is pure evil and it comes from the forces of evil that want to destroy the work of God,” said Matheson on Monday.
“God has always had a special plan for the Jewish people and there has always been forces there to try to wipe them out.”
Matheson says on Sunday night he tuned in online to listen to a special church service for Israel from the U.S.
“A Jewish person who spoke said that when he talks to a non-Jew he often wonders, ‘ Would this person be willing to hide me?’ like happened during the Second World War in Europe when Jews were being rounded up by the millions and sent to concentration camps runbytheNazis.”
Six million Jews were murdered in the Holocaust but many Jews were saved by gentiles who risked their own lives to hide them and care for them.
“It’s so important that we stand with the Jewish people,” Matheson urged. “They have suffered so much down through the centuries and the people of faith need to stand with them and say I would be willing to sacrifice my life to protect you. I’d be willing to hide you, I’d be willing to do whatever I can to make sure your life is safe.”
Miller says he first learned of the murderous rampage during Saturday’s three-hour service that he leads when a Jewish neighbour came over to tell him. Because he’s Orthodox, he and the rest of his congregation do not access electronic media until the Sabbath ends after sundown.
Miller says most synagogues around the world lock their doors at all times and must hire someone to man the doors to let people in during services and at other times.
“We have to be all the more vigilant now,” said Miller.
“But we remain optimists for the future,” he added. “We celebrate life. Yes, there are enemies out there but there are many more friends and we refuse to live in fear and be paranoid.”
These incidents which show the worst of humanity also bring out the best of humanity.